Not in the Plans (Jackson Calhoun)

**Update: I checked my blog stats this morning and far more people have read Jackson’s story than Savvy’s. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate that you’re taking the time to read at all. Really, thank you. I just want to make sure you know that Savvy’s story is the chapter before Jackson’s. Believe me, Jackson’s story will make more sense if you read Savvy’s first. Just a suggestion though, you’re free to do as you wish. 🙂

Check out yesterday’s post before reading this one to get Chapter 1 from Savannah “Savvy” Davis’ point of view. This is Chapter 2, which is from Jackson Calhoun’s point of view.

When Jackson awoke the next morning, he was prepared to roll over, stroke Savvy’s beautiful hair and apologize for overreacting the night before. It wasn’t in his nature to hold a grudge. When he turned, however, Savvy was nowhere to be found.

Despite being an attorney, Savvy was one of the least confrontational people Jackson had ever met. She had to play it tough to make it in the predominantly male legal world, but deep down, Jackson knew Savvy simply wanted everyone to like her.

Savvy had never let him go to bed angry with her. She always snuck in and quietly slipped into bed and cuddled up next to him. It was her way of saying sorry. She hated to fight, but she wasn’t very good at admitting fault either.

Jackson felt his muscles tighten and his fists clinching under the thin cotton sheet. If Savvy was ok with him going to bed angry, did she care what he thought at all anymore?

Jackson ripped back the sheets went about getting ready for work. As a manager for his father’s construction business, he awoke a couple of hours before Savvy every morning. With her long hours, he was often frustrated at their tendency to pass like ships in the night. This morning he was thankful for it.

Jackson slipped past Savvy on the couch and crossed the condo to the front door. Savvy wouldn’t be awakened by the alarm all the way in there on the couch. He should probably wake her so she could move to the bed for a couple of hours or at least move the alarm into the living room. She’d be furious if she slept in and missed the opportunity to bill some hours at the firm. With that in mind, and the need to teach her a little lesson, he took extra care to quietly maneuver out the front door.As he made his way to the construction site in the early morning darkness, Jackson thought about how things had changed since he met Savvy. Back then she had been fresh out of law school, with an outgoing personality and a seemingly permanent smile on her face.

That first night, Jackson had watched her from across the room at a sports bar where he was having dinner on his way home. She was standing at a high-top table with several other girls, drinking and laughing. They were getting pretty loud and kept clinking their glasses together in cheers over something he couldn’t quite hear.

He had been about halfway through his meal when she had bounced up to the bar to order a drink, clearly a little tipsy. She had squeezed her small frame between him and the stranger who sat on the stool next to him, and he found himself searching for an excuse to talk to her.

As he weighed his options for an opening line he could use to say hi to the beautiful, smiling blonde, she looked down at the sandwich on his plate and exclaimed, “Hey, that looks yummy! I’m famished!”

“Maybe you should order a burger or something to go with that beer then,” he had suggested with a smile of his own. He remembered silently cursing his bad luck that the barstool next to him had just been taken by a traveling salesman type only minutes before. Otherwise, he could have suggested she take a seat.

“You know what, I think I will!” she had said very matter-of-factly before turning to flag down the bartender.

His first thought had been how impressed he was that she actually ate red meat and wasn’t like the rabbit-food eating girls he’d been dating lately. That thought was quickly followed by a brainstorm of ways to continue their conversation.

He had watched her lean over the bar and order her beer and burger. She was taller than the average woman, with long, lean legs and small, delicate features. Her long blonde hair fell in soft waves below her shoulder blades, and the black dress she wore made her skin and hair appear even paler than they probably were. She was downright perky and bubbly though, and her eyes and cheeks lit up when she talked.

As luck would have it, the bartender had to go to the back to restock the beer she had ordered. “So,” he asked her, “looks like you girls are celebrating over there.” He nodded his head toward the group of girls she’d left on the other side of the room.

“Yeah! A couple of us just finished the bar exam today, so it seemed like the right time for a drink!”

Or two, or three, he thought as he judged her level of inebriation. “The bar exam, huh? So you’re a smart one?”

Jackson figured his chances with her had just taken a dive from improbable to impossible. He was just a foreman for his father’s construction company. Sure, he was finishing up business school at night so he could one day take over the business, but right now he spent all day on a job site getting sweaty and dirty.

“No”, she said, suddenly looking embarrassed, “I’ve just always wanted to be a lawyer. It’s no big deal. What do you do?”

“Here ya go,” the bartender had said as he slid a Corona across the bar at her. Saved by the bartender, Jackson thought.

She got distracted trying to cram her lime down into the long neck of the bottle and seemed to forget she’d asked him a question. “Well, I better go back to my friends,” she said glancing back across the room. “Nice talking to you though! I’m Savannah, by the way. My friends call me Savvy.” She extended her hand to shake his.

“Jackson,” he had said as he grasped her thin hand in his.

“Nice to meet you, Jackson.” With that she flashed one final smile before turning and walking back to her friends.

Oh well, he had figured, so much for that. He had finished his steak sandwich and beer and almost forgotten about the bubbly blonde when she appeared again at his side just as he was signing his bill. “I know this is totally random,” she gushed, “but I really enjoyed talking to you. Maybe you’d want to call me sometime?” She handed him a bar napkin with her number scrawled across in big bold numbers.

He’d chuckled to himself as she struggled to remain perched on her tall, black heels. “Maybe I will,” he had said to her as he slid off the stool and stood next to her to stuff the napkin in his pocket. He remembered shaking his head as he walked off and left her standing at the bar behind him. She’d caught him off guard when she brought her number over. Maybe he would call her.

The loud ringing of his cell phone in the cup holder brought him back to the present. He wasn’t fond of fancy ringtones, but at that moment he cursed the loud, old-fashioned ring that had jolted him out of his trip down memory lane. He glanced at the caller id and saw it was his best friend and coworker, James.

“I’m almost there, what do you want?” Jackson barked into the phone.

“Dude, I was just looking through your desk for the file on Hartford Place and I found a little black box. This rock is huge, man. Savvy’s gonna love it!”

James had a knack for bad timing. He also had no respect for another man’s privacy.. “Shit, James! What are you doing digging around my desk drawers? Put that back!”

“Come on, man. We’ve been friends since we were kids. Why didn’t you tell me you bought Savvy a ring?”

“Put it back, James,” Jackson said firmly, “I’ll be there in a minute.” Jackson hung up before James could say anything else. He threw the phone back in the cup holder and gripped the steering wheel until his knuckles turned white. The last thing he wanted to talk about right now was that damn ring.

4 thoughts on “Not in the Plans (Jackson Calhoun)”

I read Jackson as the first. So I wasn’t sure if there was an affair going on with Savvy or not. I kinda liked it that way it put me against Jackson…but then for him when I read Savvy. Made me dieing for a third chapter…that’s for sure! 🙂